Before we start, we first list what hardware requirements you need to
successfully install Gentoo on your box. This of course depends on your
architecture.

The SPARC Architecture

Check the following requirements before you
continue with the Gentoo installation:

You need at least 1 Gb of free disk space

If you do not use prebuilt packages, you need at least 300 Mb of memory (RAM +
swap)

For the SPARC architecture, you should check with the UltraLinux FAQ

Make your ChoiceIntroduction

Still interested in trying out Gentoo? Well, then it is now time to
choose the installation medium you want to use. Yes, you have the
choice, no, they are not all equal, and yes, the result is always the same: a
Gentoo base system.

The installation media we will describe are:

Gentoo's Minimal LiveCD

Gentoo's Universal LiveCD

Every single media has its advantages and disadvantages. We will list
the pros and cons of every medium so you have all the information to
make a justified decision. But before we continue, let's explain our
three-stage installation.

The Three Stages

Gentoo Linux can be installed using one of three stage tarball files.
The one you choose depends on how much of the system you want to compile
yourself. The stage1 tarball is used when you want to bootstrap and
build the entire system from scratch. The stage2 tarball is used for
building the entire system from a bootstrapped "semi-compiled" state.
The stage3 tarball already contains a basic Gentoo Linux system that has
been built for you. As we will explain later, you can also install
Gentoo without compiling anything (except your kernel and some optional
packages). If you want this, you have to use a stage3 tarball.

Now what stage do you have to choose?

Starting from a stage1 allows you to have total control over the
optimization settings and optional build-time functionality that is
initially enabled on your system. This makes stage1 installs good for
power users who know what they are doing. It is also a great
installation method for those who would like to know more about the
inner workings of Gentoo Linux.

A stage1 installation can only be performed when you have a working
Internet connection.

Stage1

Pros and Cons

+

Allows you to have total control over the optimization settings and optional
build-time functionality that is initially enabled on your system

+

Suitable for powerusers that know what they are doing

+

Allows you to learn more about the inner workings of Gentoo

-

Takes a long time to finish the installation

-

If you don't intend to tweak the settings, it is probably a waste of time

-

Not suitable for networkless installations

Stage2 installs allow you to skip the bootstrap process and doing this
is fine if you are happy with the optimization settings that we chose
for your particular stage2 tarball.

A stage2 installation can only be performed when you have a working
Internet connection.

Stage2

Pros and Cons

+

You don't need to bootstrap

+

Faster than starting with stage1

+

You can still tweak your settings

-

You cannot tweak as much as with a stage1

-

It's not the fastest way to install Gentoo

-

You have to accept the optimizations we chose for the bootstrap

-

Not suitable for networkless installations

Choosing to go with a stage3 allows for the fastest install of Gentoo
Linux, but also means that your base system will have the optimization
settings that we chose for you (which to be honest, are good settings
and were carefully chosen to enhance performance while maintaining
stability). stage3 is also required if you want to install Gentoo using
prebuilt packages or without a network connection.

Stage3

Pros and Cons

+

Fastest way to get a Gentoo base system

+

Suitable for networkless installations

-

You cannot tweak the base system - it's built already

-

You cannot brag about having used stage1 or stage2

Write down (or remember) what stage you want to use. You need this later when
you decide what LiveCD (or other installation medium) you want to use. You might
be interested to know that, if you decide to use different optimization settings
after having installed Gentoo, you will be able to recompile your entire system
with the new optimization settings.

Now take a look at the available installation media.

Gentoo LiveCDs

The Gentoo LiveCDs are bootable CDs which contain a
self-sustained Gentoo environment. They allow you to boot Linux from the CD.
During the boot process your hardware is detected and the appropriate drivers
are loaded. They are maintained by Gentoo developers.

All LiveCDs allow you to boot, set up networking, initialize your
partitions and start installing Gentoo from the Internet. However, some
LiveCDs also contain all necessary source code so you are able to install
Gentoo without a working network configuration.

Now what do these LiveCDs contain?

Gentoo's Minimal LiveCD

This is a small, no-nonsense, bootable CD which sole purpose is to boot the
system, prepare the networking and continue with the Gentoo installation. It
does not contain any stages (or, in some cases, a single stage1 file),
source code or precompiled packages. For example the sparc64 variant of this
LiveCD can be found in the sparc64/ subdirectory and is called
install-sparc64-minimal-2004.1.iso.

Minimal LiveCD

Pros and Cons

+

Smallest download

+

Suitable for a complete architecture

+

You can do a stage1, stage2 or stage3 by getting the stage tarball off the
net

-

Contains no stages, no Portage snapshot, no GRP packages and therefore not
suitable for networkless installation

Gentoo's Universal LiveCD

Gentoo's Universal LiveCD is a bootable CD suitable to install Gentoo without
networking. It contains a stage1 and stage3 tarballs (optimized for the
sparc architecture). For example the sparc64 variant of this CD is called
install-sparc64-universal-2004.1.iso and can be found in the
sparc64/ subdirectory.

If you take a closer look into the directories you will see
that we provide a Gentoo Package CD. This CD (which isn't
bootable) only contains precompiled packages and can be used to install software
after a succesfull Gentoo Installation. To install Gentoo, you only
need the Universal LiveCD, but if you want OpenOffice.org, Mozilla, KDE, GNOME
etc. without having to compile every single one of them, you need the Packages
CD too. Such a Packages CD for sparc64 is called
packages-sparc64-2004.1.iso.

You only need the Packages CD if you want to perform a stage3 with GRP
installation.

Contains everything you need. You can even install without a network
connection.

-

Huge download

Download, Burn and Boot a Gentoo LiveCDDownloading and Burning the LiveCDs

You have chosen to use a Gentoo LiveCD (if not, then you are reading the
wrong section). We'll first start by downloading and burning the chosen
LiveCD. We previously discussed the several available LiveCDs, but where can you
find them?

Visit one of our mirrors and go to
releases/sparc/2004.1/livecd where the LiveCD(s) of
your choice are located. Inside the subdirectories sparc32/ and
sparc64/ you'll find so-called ISO-files.
Those are full CD images which you can write on a CD-R.

In case you wonder if your downloaded file is corrupted or not, you can
check its MD5 checksum and compare it with the MD5 checksum we provide (such as
install-sparc64-minimal-2004.1.iso.md5). You can check the MD5
checksum with the md5sum tool under Linux/Unix or md5sum for Windows.

Another way to check the validity of the downloaded file is to use GnuPG to
verify the cryptographic signature that we provide (the file ending with
.asc). Download the signature file and obtain the public key:

$ gpg --keyserver pgp.mit.edu --recv-keys 17072058

Now verify the signature:

$ gpg --verify <signature file> <downloaded iso>

To burn the downloaded ISO(s), you have to select raw-burning. How you
do this is highly program-dependent. We will discuss cdrecord and
K3B here; more information can be found in our Gentoo FAQ.

With cdrecord, you simply type cdrecord dev=/dev/hdc (replace
/dev/hdc with your CD-RW drive's device path) followed
by the path to the ISO file :)

Insert the Gentoo LiveCD in the CD-ROM and boot your system. During startup,
press Stop-A to enter OpenBootPROM (OBP). Once you are in the OBP, boot from the
CD-ROM:

ok boot cdrom

You will be greeted by the SILO boot manager (on the LiveCD). Type in
gentoo-2.4 (single-CPU kernel) or gentoo-2.4-smp
(multi-CPU kernel) and press enter to continue booting the system. In the
following example we'll boot the gentoo-2.4 kernel.

boot: gentoo-2.4

Once the LiveCD is booted, you will be greeted by a login prompt. Log on as
root. There is no password, so when you are asked for one, press Enter.

login: root
password: (Press Enter here)

You should have a root ("#") prompt on the current console and can also switch
to other consoles by pressing Alt-F2, Alt-F3 and Alt-F4. Get back to the one you
started on by pressing Alt-F1.

Continue with Extra Hardware Configuration.

Extra Hardware Configuration

If not all hardware is supported out-of-the-box, you will need to load the
appropriate kernel modules.

In the next example we try to load the 8139too module (support for
certain kinds of network interfaces):

# modprobe 8139too

Optional: Tweaking Hard Disk Performance

If you are an advanced user, you might want to tweak the IDE hard disk
performance using hdparm. With the -tT options you can
test the performance of your disk (execute it several times to get a
more precise impression):

# hdparm -tT /dev/hda

To tweak, you can use any of the following examples (or experiment
yourself) which use /dev/hda as disk (substitute with your
disk):

If you plan on giving other people access to your installation
environment or you want to chat using irssi without root privileges (for
security reasons), you need to create the necessary user accounts and change
the root password.

You can change your user id from root to the newly created user by using
su:

# su - john

Optional: Viewing Documentation while Installing

If you want to view the Gentoo Handbook (either from-CD or online) during the
installation, make sure you have created a user account (see Optional: User Accounts). Then press Alt-F2 to
go to a new terminal and log in.

If you want to view the documentation on the CD you can immediately run
links2 to read it:

# links2 /mnt/cdrom/docs/html/index.html

However, it is preferred that you use the online Gentoo Handbook as it will be
more recent than the one provided on the CD. You can view it using links2
as well, but only after having completed the Configuring your Network
chapter (otherwise you won't be able to go on the Internet to view the
document):

# links2 http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-sparc.xml

You can go back to your original terminal by pressing Alt-F1.

Optional: Starting the SSH Daemon

If you want to allow other users to access your computer during the
Gentoo installation (perhaps because those users are going to help you
install Gentoo, or even do it for you), you need to create a user
account for them and perhaps even provide them with your root password
(only do that if you fully trust that user).

To fire up the SSH daemon, execute the following command:

# /etc/init.d/sshd start

To be able to use sshd, you first need to set up your networking. Continue with
the chapter on Configuring your Network.